


The Insiders

by brooklynisosm



Category: The Outsiders - S. E. Hinton
Genre: Cheerleaders, Feminist Themes, Implied Relationships, Multi, Period-Typical Sexism, The Socs, popular girls
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-22
Updated: 2016-05-22
Packaged: 2018-06-10 03:23:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6937726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brooklynisosm/pseuds/brooklynisosm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cherry Valance is a Soc. From the outside, her life seems perfect- she's rich, beautiful, and dating an equally perfect boy named Bob. But not everything is as it seems.<br/>Cherry feels fake. The only person she can be honest with is her best friend, Marcia. She feels like the only recognition she ever gets is on her appearance. And she wonders if she really loves Bob, or if she's just convinced herself that she has.<br/>This is the story of Cherry Valance, a girl who looks put-together but whose life is falling apart.<br/>This is the story from the inside.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Insiders

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! I haven't found many fics from Cherry's perspective that aren't about her having a relationship with Ponyboy or even Dallas and so I decided to write one myself!  
> This is going to be multi-chapter. Please enjoy! :)

My parents didn’t know I watched sunsets. Neither did my friends, besides Marcia- she was the only person I think I was ever honest to. It was one of the last things I told Bob- at first he thought I was joking. He laughed once before he saw my face. 

“Cherry, babe, why watch sunsets when there’s so much else to do?” He’d said with a familiar expression on his handsome face. The expression that meant, 'why am I still with her'?

'Because she’s pretty'. 

We’re all shallow. All of us in my friend group. We’re always trying to be better than each other; even if nobody ever says it, the competition is obvious. It’s like a race that you can only win by getting the best grades and being liked by the most people and dressing the nicest and having the prettiest girlfriend if you’re a boy or if you’re me, having Bob. 

He was always the leader of the pack. He made his own rules. He was naturally smart but never studied and sometimes skipped. Still, he was always on the honor roll. So was I, but nobody ever seemed to notice. Beautiful girls don’t need to be smart, or at least that’s what people seem to think. I study every night and the only praise I get is for a face I didn’t work for. But where I am in life, it seems I’ll never have to work for anything.

I don’t know if I’m okay with that. 

I am beautiful. Boys look at me with lust. Girls with envy. When I see myself in the mirror, I can’t deny it. I’m Cherry Valance, the lovely cheerleader, the popular socialite, Bob Sheldon’s girl, whom everyone likes. 

Or, I was. 

Bob never fully accepted the fact that I thought. A lot. I was always thinking. And he was always doing. He was doing things- wrong things, things I warned him against, and he did those things up until the moment he died. 

When I found out, a part of me thought bitterly, if he’d only listened to me…

But then I felt awful because Bob was dead and I should’ve only been remembering the good things about him. His intelligence, his humor. The tinder behind his eyes, the kindling that, unmonitored, would start a brush fire. The face that was as handsome as mine was beautiful- we had made a perfect pair. 

Now I was to dutifully weep. 

I always knew Bob was trouble but I never expected that he’d die. I never thought that anyone would die- anyone that I knew, at least. Death had always seemed like poverty, or low social status...present in the world, but not affecting me, never something I would have to worry about. I know I was wrong.  
I think it all changed the day Bob died.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That morning we talked about greasers. 

“Cherry! Wait up!”

I tensed until I realized it was Marcia calling down the hall. I slowed down walking and turned around. She sprinted up to me, her shoes squeaking on the floor. I could tell they were new. 

“I didn’t catch you at your locker.” She said, shifting her books from one arm to the other so that we could link by the elbow. We walked arm in arm to our next class, math. I was always good at math. I even thought of becoming a teacher- until the guidance counselor said that wasn’t a ‘valid career choice’ for an ‘individual such as yourself’. Meaning a pretty rich girl. I was supposed to be bad at math. 

“I got my books quicker than usual today.” I said, omitting my reason. A greaser had moved lockers and now was next to mine. Most of my friends found them disgusting, but I thought they were just plain intriguing. They were dangerous...and that made my pulse pound in my wrists in a way I feared. I was sure to get my stuff quick before he arrived. I wasn’t in the mood to feel guilty that morning. 

“Did you finish your essay for English on time?” Marcia said, snapping her gum.

“Would I not?” I rolled my eyes. “The question is, did you?”

Marcia, looking not the least bit remorseful, said, “Nope.”

“Do you have an excuse?”

“I’m going to say we had extra cheer practice,” she said, “you know how Ms. Turner supports the football team.” 

Many of our teachers forgave our academic underachievement in favor of our cheerleading duties. Perhaps sports were more important than a successful future in Tulsa. At least for girls.

“Did you see Tina’s skirt?” I said. 

“There wasn’t much of it to see.” Marcia took a chomp on her gum and blew another bubble, smudging her lip gloss. “She’s dressing like a greasy girl. Still, I can’t say it looked bad...”

“Yeah…” I said. “Hey, Marcia?”

“What?” 

“Did you ever think about what it would be like to be a greaser?”

She wrinkled her nose. “Why would I want to?” Her hair flipped, an instinct that came whenever we talked about them. 

“I don’t know…” I mused. “I guess I just wonder sometime what it would be like. To act like that, to live on the East side, you know? How different it would be. Have you ever driven through one of their neighborhoods? It almost makes me sad.”

This is why I like Marcia: when nobody else is honest with me, she is. Anyone else would start teasing me to start a charity, ‘The Greaser and Hood Endowment Fund’ or something like that. Marcia just looked at me, pursed her half-glossed lips, and nodded.

“I wouldn’t want to be one of them.” Marcia said. “But sometimes I wonder what it’s like.” 

We were sympathetic towards them. We didn’t want to be their friends, but we didn’t think they were evil, either. 

We just walked in silence for a few seconds. Silence usually meant there was something wrong. If you weren’t talking, you weren’t having fun. Marcia was the only person I could talk to without talking to. Looking back on it, she was my one true friend. I was certain that I liked her. As for my other friends, I tried to avoid the thought that I didn’t enjoy myself at all in their company. 

People waved at us in the halls. I got a few compliments, ones that passed in one ear and out the other- the same things. Cherry, you look nice today! Cherry, I love your sweater! Cute socks, Cherry! They all knew our names; we were popular and rich and they knew if they were rude to us then they would be socially disgraced. 

I found it almost funny how Bob threatened to beat anyone up who disrespected me, yet he never seemed to show me any respect himself. 

“Cherry?” Marcia called me back to earth with a tap to my shoulder. “What are you thinking?”

“What would happen if I came to school one day wearing no make-up and the ugliest dress I could find. What would happen if I woke up one morning and decided I was done with being pretty.” I said. 

Marcia frowned. “I can’t imagine it. You’re always pretty. You don’t even need make-up.” 

I shook my head.

“You make anything look good.” Marcia continued.

“That’s what frustrates me.” I said. “Even if I tried, I couldn’t look bad. Even if I tried, I couldn’t get anyone to think badly of me.”

“Why is that frustrating?” Marcia said. “I’d kill for your looks. Honestly. Everyone would. You can get anything you want.”

“I don’t know.” I said. “I just- I don’t want to spend my life relying on my face to get me through any situation. There’s more to me, at least you know that. Nobody will ever see that.”

Marcia paused, looking at me thoughtfully. Her eyes were brown and kind of round. Marica always said she wasn’t as pretty as me, but I’d like to look like her. She looked smart- her hair was neat and her eyes had intelligence that I could never find in mine. The one time I told her this, she shoved my shoulder but flushed all the same. I never told any of our other girl-friends that I wanted to look like them.

Pretty girl’s word is law. 

“Why’d you start thinking about this?” She said as we climbed the stairs to the second floor of our high school. “Is everything all right?” 

“No.” I said. “I feel fake.”

Marcia looked conflicted for a second, then leaned over to whisper in my ear through my hair, “So do I.” She breathed. She smelled like shampoo, some sort of sweet perfume, orange juice, and bubble gum. When she pulled back her head, she said in a quiet voice, “But can we talk about it in private?”

I was opening my mouth to reply when I saw her eyes dart in front of us. I followed her gaze and understood. There were some of our friends- Debbie, Jacqueline, and Beverly. We were all on the cheer team together and lived in the same neighborhood. These were the girls I lied to on impulse. I wouldn’t even tell them honestly what shade of lipstick I was wearing. 

I grabbed Marcia’s hand. 

“Marcia! Cherry!” Jacqueline said with a smile plastered on her face. She was a brunette, but her hair was lighter than Marcia’s, more of a chestnut shade. She had wide blue eyes that blinked too much. 

“Hi!” Marcia said brightly. She, too, smiled, and I followed suit. If anything, we were good actresses.

“Where are you girls off to?” Debbie asked, falling into step next to us. Her bleached hair was pulled into a tight ponytail. She was the tallest of us, and very thin. She complained that she couldn’t wear anything cute because every skirt she tried looked too short on her long legs. 

“Math.” I said. “I thought we were going to learn each other’s schedules. You’re going to gym.”

I watched for her reaction. I hadn’t meant to sound accusatory. Debbie’s white-toothed smile faltered for a second, but she managed to salvage it just in time.

“Of course.” Debbie said. “Silly me.”

“Ugh, gym class is the worst.” Beverly spoke up. “There are greasers in that class. Everyone knows greasers are pervs.” 

“Some of them are.” I said. I knew of a few. The names of boys that were attractive but volatile, dangerous, to be avoided. But the boys on the football team could be pervs as well. Bob had once told me that Beverly’s boyfriend James was only with her for her body. I didn’t add to my statement, though. 

“All of them are.” Debbie said. “Have you seen them? The greasy hair gives everything away. And their shifty little eyes. They’re probably on drugs.”

“One in my science class even pulled out a knife once!” Beverly supplied. “I thought he was going to kill someone!”

“They’re just poor.” Marcia said. “That doesn’t make them murderers.” 

I squeezed her hand, a sign of approval. 

“Oh, yeah?” Jacqueline said and blinked several times. “Have you ever heard of Dallas Winston?” I had. Everyone knew about Dallas Winston. “I know for a fact he’s killed someone before.”

“No!” Marcia gasped. “Who?”

“I don’t know. Someone in New York.” 

“Tim Shepard’s killed people too.” Beverly said. “He just looks like he has.” 

“Are you saying they’ve killed people because you have real evidence?’ I said. “Or because they look like it?”

“All greasers are dangerous, Cherry.” Debbie said. “Just stay away from them.”

“Handsome as the Devil,” Jacqueline agreed, “but evil as him too.” She fluttered her eyelashes and smoothed her clothes. 

I didn’t know why I had the urge to argue with them on this. But their generalization bothered me. It was like saying that all Socs were stuck up. Some of us were. Some of us weren’t. 

“What about Sodapop Curtis?” I said. “I know you get gas more than you need to, Jacqueline.” 

Jacqueline flushed and blinked, taken-aback. “I don’t...he’s different. Not like the rest of those no-good freaks.” 

“He’s definitely a greaser.” Marcia said. “He wears his hair long and everything.” Her fingers tightened around my palm. 

Jacqueline narrowed her blinky eyes. “I go to the gas station for gas. Not for Sodapop Curtis, beautiful as he is.” 

“Stop dreaming about greasers, Cherry.” Debbie said. “You have Bob. Remember?”

Yes. I had Bob. He was as much danger as I needed. 

We didn’t pursue it further. It was time for class. Had I said anything else, it could have been catastrophic.


End file.
